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Airlines for America and the Regional Airline Association have submitted an application to the Federal Aviation Administration to suspend the three-hour tarmac delay rule due to recent furloughs of air-traffic controllers. "To be clear, A4A and RAA are not proposing that DOT suspend the effectiveness of the tarmac regulations in general," the application said. "On the contrary, our requested exemption is narrowly tailored and would only apply for a temporary period at all U.S. airports."

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The Department of Transportation recently released a report stating that no domestic flights reported tarmac delays longer than three hours in the month of August. The report also shows a record high of on-time arrival performance and record low cancellation rate for the period of January-August.

The 18 largest airlines in the U.S. reported that no flights in October were delayed on the tarmac for more than three hours, according to the Department of Transportation's Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Since April, when federal regulators imposed penalties on airlines for tarmac delays exceeding three hours, only 12 have been reported. That compares with 546 during the same period last year. But critics argue that more than 380,000 passengers have experienced flight cancellations as a result of the rule, while nearly 50,000 more were returned to the gate in order to avoid potentially devastating fines.

With the FAA set to begin stiff new fines for lengthy tarmac delays, airlines say they will simply cancel flights earlier to avoid financial penalties. Experts say the 34,000-plus flights canceled last month due to severe weather may be a sign of what's to come. "It's hard to predict right now how significant it's going to be, but I don't think there is any question we'll see significantly more flights canceled because no one wants to subject their company to those fines," says James May, president of the Air Transport Association, which lobbied against the three-hour rule. Both airlines and airports agree it will take time to adjust to the new rule. But James Crites, executive vice president at Dallas Fort-Worth International Airport, says eventually the right balance will be struck: "The industry is very adaptable. We will find a way to make it work."

JetBlue officials have asked the Department of Transportation for a delay in enforcing the new tarmac rule, effective April 29, which will allow travelers to deboard from a domestic flight that has sat on the runway for three hours. JetBlue's request affects its flights at New York's JFK Airport, where runway repairs are expected to adversely affect takeoffs throughout 2010. "Requiring JetBlue, the largest operator at JFK, to return its flights to gates for deplaning after a three-hour tarmac delay will bring added operational stress to JFK and will severely disrupt travel for thousands of its passengers," the airline said.

"This is President Obama's Passenger Bill of Rights," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood on Monday, announcing regulations designed to limit the effect and duration of tarmac delays. The rules, which take effect in 120 days, require airlines to provide food and drink after a two-hour delay, and mandate that the plane either depart or return passengers to the gate in the event of a three-hour delay. Though hailed by some passenger-rights advocates as a "Christmas miracle," experts said stiff fines of $27,500 per passenger would require airlines to re-engineer their entire schedule to comply with the rule. The Air Transport Association said airlines "will comply with the new rule even though we believe it will lead to unintended consequences -- more [canceled] flights and greater passenger inconvenience."